CHIEF JUSTICE MR ANTHONY GATES - Address at the Admissions Ceremony for the newly admitted Legal Practitioners for Fiji
07/02/2014
CHIEF JUSTICE MR ANTHONY GATES
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Address by the Presiding Judge Mr. Justice Anthony Gates, Chief Justice at the Admissions Ceremony for the newly admitted Legal Practitioners for Fiji
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Supreme Court
Friday 7th February, 2014
Suva
0930 Hours
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Hon. Resident Justice of Appeal &
Justices of Appeal of the Court of Appeal
Hon. Justices of the High Court
Hon. Attorney-General
Chief Magistrate & Learned Resident Magistrates
Mr. Director of Public Prosecutions
Mr. Director of the Legal Aid Commission
Dr. Akanisi Kedrayate, the Dean of the Faculty of Arts, Law and Education
Counsel who have moved the Petitions for Admission
Family and friends of those newly admitted
Newly admitted Legal Practitioners
This is the admissions ceremony specially for the Law Graduates of the University of the South Pacific. Remember your university when you leave court today and go out into the world to practice your calling. They will ask which university were you at. Your integrity, your proficiency, your professionalism, your thoroughness, and your polite way of dealing with clients, fellow counsel and the court will reflect upon your university. Do not let down those who strove to teach you and the institution you attended.
So I will commence by thanking your University, the Vice-Chancellor, the Dean, the lecturers and staff for what they have done to bring you this far.
Having read all of the admission files, and having listened to Counsel moving your admissions, I now formally make orders in each of your cases granting your petitions for admission. Where necessary I allow a shortening of time within which the petitions needed to be filed.
You have each taken an oath or affirmation that you will truly and honestly conduct yourself in the practice as a legal practitioner according to the best of your knowledge and ability. We hope that oath will remind you of your duties to act at all times as a practitioner professionally devoted to your clients and to act as a responsible, committed, honourable and noble officer of the court. And further that you will at all times be courteous to court, counsel, litigants, and witnesses, whilst maintaining moral courage and demonstrating true independence.
I congratulate each one of you. I know I am joined by my brother and sister judges, masters, and magistrates and I congratulate you on behalf of your families, your communities and your country. You are all welcomed to the Bar, and thus to the legal fraternity.
We are limited for space at these ceremonies. If there are 23 or so admittees and each wanted to bring along 3 relatives or friends the courtroom would have 92 persons to be accommodated just from the admittees alone. Then there are the judges, magistrates, counsel, court staff and the media. You can see our problem.
I can report that there will be a continuance this year of the court building programme. We will continue to repair and modernize our courts, to restore Government Buildings including the clock tower, to commence the new Lautoka High Court Building, and to press on with out station courthouse improvements. In particular this concerns the Magistrate’s Courts at Nadi, Ba and Rakiraki, as well as Nabouwalu, Taveuni and Vunidawa. This year too I hope to see the remaining courts, which are presently without, being installed with audio recording equipment. Most should have video facilities installed by the end of the year as well. We will be working on improving our transcription services. These improvements are not only long overdue, they will transform practice at the Bar and facilitate a swifter service.
Today is a big day for you, rightly so. It is a milestone in your life. That is why not only your family and friends are here with you, but the judiciary who traditionally attend in numbers, are present also to pay you respect for this achievement. You are the persons who must one day carry on the onerous role of the Senior Bar and the Bench.
But to have reached this far, for most of you, it will not always have been easy. Some started late because of family or finance problems. Struggles make for a more determined disciplined professional life. Having it easy does not prepare you for tragedy or setbacks. Some of you may have wished valued mentors or indeed parents, uncles or aunts were still living to see you get admitted today, finally to see you take your oaths. Though this is a public act there is a private personal moment contained within it. That should be honoured, and those persons remembered.
It is fitting we honour also the memory of the late Mr. Justice Sriskandarajah Sundaram who died recently. He was first appointed to the Court of Appeal in 2011. At that time in Sri Lanka he occupied the position of President of the Court of Appeal. As such he held the rank of a Judge of the Supreme Court. Later he was elevated to our Supreme Court. A fuller mention of his judicial service will take place at the next sittings of the Supreme Court in April. He generously offered to sit in the Court of Appeal to start with, which is where we had the greater backlog and needed help. His judgments were learned and thorough but always to the point. He was a modest person, collegial and friendly. He will be greatly missed. Much could be learned from observing such a judge in court and by reading his judgments.
Fired up as you are with fresh enthusiasm you will probably have grand ideas of rushing out and applying for constitutional redress as soon as you leave today’s proceedings. May I advise you to take a more modest approach. Learn first the nuts and bolts of your profession. Once you have a firmer grip on the practicalities, you may then apply the advocacy skills you think you have, to speak before courts with acquired skill and confidence. Without the solid foundations of real knowledge of procedure and evidence you will be lost.
Ratu Sukuna who qualified as a barrister after Oxford and war service, was not in favour of indigenous lawyers going into private practice on their own. He feared they would be besieged with requests rather than fees. Of course, for all of us private practice demands a high degree of focus, commitment to duties, time, and a clear mind. If you have over-indulged in alcohol or yaqona mid-week you will not be able to direct an alert mind to your client’s complex problems. You must be disciplined. Would we feel safe in the hands of a sleepy hung-over surgeon or airline pilot? You will learn that you cannot afford to be unfit for the job.
All of you have commenced the study of ethics. In a phrase that is about what is the right thing to do professionally. Study all of the cases that have come out of the Independent Legal Services Commission. Avoid those errors. You must have a Trust Account when you practice. Do not tell silly stories as to why you need an adjournment. Be up front and frank with the court. Be candid. Sometimes as lawyers, after all we are human (or at least some of us are), we make an elementary error, such as we have not done what we had promised we would do by the adjournment date. Be straightforward and admit it. Invariably such honesty blows the judge’s anger away, and we all move on and get back on track.
At times in court some of you may not always be fluent or articulate. Do not be over anxious about this, you will get better. Gandhi for many of his early years of practice was unable to utter a word in court. He said he was too shy. He spoke, but nothing came out. In later years, no one would have known he had suffered so much anxiety and had such a block. For the first few years he had to give up appearing in court.
The famous writer Addison stood up in the House of Commons to make his maiden speech. He stammered and said “I conceive …” He said this three times, unable to proceed further. At which a fellow member and wit stood up and said “The gentleman conceived thrice but brought forth nothing.” Gandhi thought he would use this joke at a private dinner party he gave in London when he was studying at the Inner Temple. Unfortunately he too could get no further than Addison with the speech, and the joke of inarticulation was on him instead. Anyway Gandhi as we know overcame his shyness. In South Africa he became a great leader and speaker for the Indians of Durban, Johannesburg and Pretoria, some of whom were indentured, commanding the attention and respect of all religions and ethnicities. Perhaps you can emulate Mr. Gandhi in overcoming any shyness you feel you may have, any inarticulateness, and speak well and modestly as Gandhi did, to good purpose.
I thank counsel for moving these admissions today, and for all attendances of family and friends and members of the judiciary. We wish the new Legal Practitioners a worthwhile, useful and contented career in the Law or in whatever field you may pursue.
We will now adjourn.
A.H.C.T. Gates
Chief Justice